Modding your main guitar

[fuzzywolf]

I've dibble dabbled with little experiments on project guitars before, but I've never touched a hair on my main axe (other than changing strings).

Every once in a while, I'll think of a cool little mod for my main guitar, but I'm always super hesitant about making any changes. I always end up shooting myself down in the end. I even considered changing the knobs once, but was too afraid about how bad it might look (even though it's obvious how easy it'd be to switch back to the old ones ).

How did you guys get past that hesitation to make a "significant" change (if any) to your main instrument?

This is all assuming your go-to guitar was #1 before you made any sort of change to it and the change(s) you made were not out of necessity (e.g. replacing a broken part).

[morange]

Dive right it and fuck your guitar up good. Everything after that couldn't possibly make it worse.

Only half serious. But I ususally sell guitars I don't want to work on for whatever reason; basically, if it's valuable at all. But I do have an 80's MIJ Fat Strat I don't mess with, except for replacing the 5-way switch and jack, both which got rusty and weren't making good connections. I need to drill and dowel the floyd posts, though, the wood there is cracked. Basswood. Whenever I get a drill press I'll do it. It was my first guitar, so I sort of revere it. Plus is has a real idiosyncratic sound, unique, but it's a well played, fucked up old guitar.

But I took a router to my Baja tele and things got real. Lost control of the router (Ash is hard as fuck!), but guitar pulled though ok in the end. Wound the pickups, did all the wiring, new saddles and knobs, new pickguard. It was new until I got my hands on it, though. Never has a guitar depreciated in value so fast! Sounds a lot better now though. I had a mini humbucker in the mid position for a while, but I missed the neck-bridge setting so I took it back out.

One thing to remember, your guitar wasn't built by gods. The work you do on it very likely will be better than it had originally. Unless you suck. Hard to say which it will be until you try, haha, that's the problem I guess.

rout.jpg (49.05 KiB) Viewed 3318 times

telesmall.jpg (64.06 KiB) Viewed 3318 times

[Bassus Sanguinis]

Just take a deep breath and do it. You can get helpful books and manuals from the library and perhaps advice from the local music store. If others can do it then You can too, right?

I'm not 100% sure - it's twenty something years now - but I think I had to adjust the bridge and stuff on my new bass, when I took it apart, cleaned and checked everything and put it back together. And yes, it was really actually a cheap piece of crap bass, not a 4003 Ric or anything, but it was what I had to work with.

[dase]

I put an aluminium neck on mine and it was the best thing ever.

[Rotlung]

I have modded every guitar I've ever owned, except my current main and some I bought to try/flip. I almost always play teles, and my main is the stick I measure all other teles by. It actually has a mini humbuker in the neck but the bridge is so fat and beefy. The only mod I would consider is maybe some locking tuners, other than that, it's perfect.

[scienceman]

If I'm happy with a guitar then it stays unmodded. If a guitar needs mods to work better for me then there's no hesitation, I just start chopping shit up.

[Moose]

I've always just dived straight in and done whatever I wanted to my guitars.

Most of the stuff I've done has been easily reversible though, like wiring/changing pickups/etc. The only thing I haven't really gotten into a huge amount has been mods that require removing/replacing wood from the body and neck. Dabbled a bit with re-routing a body for a toaster pickup, but as it was a strat it meant I had the pickguard to cover up the newly gouged hole haha.

My most frequently modded guitar was (and still is) my #1, and I've got plans in place to change parts of it again

[coldbrightsunlight]

I had a mini humbucker in the mid position for a while, but I missed the neck-bridge setting so I took it back out.

It's quite an easy mod to put neck + bridge on a toggle switch with a 3 pickup guitar.

I'm happy modding my main guitar in terms of pickups, wiring, bridge, done all of those. Not sure I'd want to do any routing on it, but I think that's more that I don't see any need for it on this guitar than I don't want to wreck it, both because I've got no real plans of selling it and also it's also not weird and irreplaceable.

So yeah, I'm cool modding my main guitar, if it's the one I play all the time it should work how I want it to, right?

[AxAxSxS]

My main is a 76 Gretsch neck through blanc that I "modded" into a 12 string SG with a functional tremolo, alumitones pickups with master and independent volume control for each pup, and a single tone. I knew what I wanted and they don't make them that way.

What do you want?

Modding for the sake of it isn't a good idea but when you're after something specific, lots of info out there.

[weed_killer]

my #1 wasn't when I first put it together, but any guitar I've ever used for any given length of time has been modded in some way or another, vintage or new. I'm really particular with my gear, and nobody makes them how I want straight from the factory, so you pick ideas up, learn how to implement them and just go for it.

[Swordfishtrombone]

my #1 wasn't when I first put it together, but any guitar I've ever used for any given length of time has been modded in some way or another, vintage or new. I'm really particular with my gear, and nobody makes them how I want straight from the factory, so you pick ideas up, learn how to implement them and just go for it.

Pretty much this. It's either that I can't get what I want from a stock guitar or there's not an affordable option for me to start off with (the reason my blacktop jaguar got a different tailpiece within a few months of the purchase). If I like playing something that doesn't have all of the features that I want then I'll make a change to it without any worries. The whole point of having an instrument is to have something that plays and sounds how you want it to, so there's no reason to settle for something that you're not happy with.

[leaves turn]

I kinda want to turn my HSS Jaguar into just HS and swap in some Mastery stuff and maybe a momentary kill switch.

[ChetMagongalo]

Don't be afraid to mod your guitars. if you're worried about resale value then you're buying gear for the wrong reasons. Money isn't important, but having a cool guitar is obviously super important.

[antennafarm]

another vote for modding. make it YOURS. this is more than just a unique combination of equipment - it's gear that shows your use and abuse.. it's what connects it to you and makes it YOUR instrument.

also it destroys resale value, which is good to combat GAS!

[fuzzywolf]

Thanks for all the great advice, guys.

I'm not worried about resale value. I don't imagine I'll ever sell this instrument.

I really enjoy my guitar how it is, but I do have a couple mods in mind. I know the mods I have in mind would improve the guitar, but I guess I'm a little afraid to fuck up something I'm already satisfied with.

But you definitely have me convinced. I should make it my guitar, and not just another copy from the factory.

Thanks again!